Jake Song, a name that many MMORPG fans are familiar with for his involvement with the ArcheAge and Lineage series and his founding of XLGames, has decided to leave the company after 22 years.
According to reporting from Korean outlet Bizwatch (and run through Google Translate), Song left the company sometime in January in order to “take some time to recharge.” Readers may remember that Song stepped down as CEO of XLGames in 2023 but remained a director for the company as he focused his efforts on developing ArcheAge Chronicles. Fair or not, particularly vocal gamers also lay the failures of the original ArcheAge, which led to its subsequent shutdown last summer, at Song’s feet.
This news naturally brings up the question of what exactly happened to prompt Song to leave at such a precipitous moment – and what will happen to the multi-delayed “online action RPG” without him. Reporting also confirmed that general producer Ham Yong-jin will continue to work on the game with no apparent change to its early 2026 release or its first closed beta test coming in the second half of this year.
